Postgame Avs-Sharks: Surprise!

Colorado Avalanche Kevin Porter (12) gets mobbed by teammates after his game winning goal in overtime to defeat the San Jose Sharks 4-3 November 17, 2010 at Pepsi Center. John Leyba, The Denver Post

A lot of “get me rewrite” up in the press box tonight. The done-like-dinner Avs come back to win a shocker instead over the Sharks, which might not have been as big a surprise as who scored the OT winner – Kevin Porter – and how he scored.

That was a genuinely great goal the occasionally-maligned Porter scored. I guess that’s why the kid once won a Hobey Baker, yeah?

Biggest play of the night for my money though? The combination heads-up pass by John Liles – capitalizing after Joe Thornton foolishly went to retrieve his lost stick in the Avs’ zone instead of doing what you’re taught to do in hockey, go to the bench and get a twig from a teammate and stay in the play defensively – and sick wrister from Chris Stewart for the goal that made it 3-2.

Stewart was a beast in the final 12 minutes, and his goal woke everybody up. Unfortunately for the Avs, that didn’t include many fans in the stands. Ace columnist colleague Mark Kiszla takes a look at the Avs’ ongoing attendance problems in his piece for tomorrow’s Post. Only 12,436 announced tonight – and that was the announced crowd. In other words, that was the “Here’s the number we’ll make up to make it look more respectable” figure given by the Burgundy and Blue.

I’m not going to harp forever on the attendance, and I’m not going to throw you, the fans, under the bus for it. It’s always the fault of the team when they don’t sell tickets. It’s their problem to solve, not yours. But the fact is, the Avs entered the game ranked 25th in the NHL in attendance, were 27th last season and 26th the year before.

But back to the game: A feelgood win for the Avs, but let’s not ignore some of the alarm bells either. They were outshot 43-22 – though some of that had to do with the disparity in power plays. Then again, you make your own man-advantage situations with your play, and vice-versa.

The defensive combo of Ryan Wilson and Adam Foote, as anyone who saw the game knows, had some major problems tonight. Fact is, they had big-time issues the other night against St. Louis too. Both were a minus-2 tonight, were on the ice for all three Sharks goals and were lucky they weren’t assessed a fourth when a Sharks goal was disallowed on video review in the third (a no-goal coach Joe Sacco called a “fortunate break for us.”)

The question going forward is: how do you justify playing either guy right now over Jonas Holos? And what do you do when Kyle Quincey comes back, which should be soon?

My opinion: Holos should be in, and you can take your pick right now over who to bench, between Wilson or Foote. Sacco got off the hook a bit tonight with the comeback, because we were all ready to get out the long knives over his decision to bench the well-playing Holos in favor of Wilson.

If Holos is benched again, then Sacco clearly will have bent his rule of “we’re going to play the players who are doing the best job and give us the best chance to win” mantra.

I’m not saying Holos was playing like Bobby Orr, but there’s no way Wilson/Foote have been better than him of late.

The other question that’s starting to brew: should Peter Budaj be put back on the bench when Craig Anderson is cleared to return, which should be any day now?

Budaj was excellent after the Sharks made it a 3-1 game on a soft goal, so give him credit. But Anderson not only deserves, but will get the starting job when he’s ready. If he’s terrible for two or three straight games after that? Then maybe we’ll have a goaltending controversy on our hands. But for now Budaj has proven himself to be a capable backup and deserves huge credit for keeping the team afloat in Anderson’s absence. Yes, Budaj has also benefited from his team being one of the highest-scoring in the league. But the right thing to do is to give Anderson the top job back and let him prove again that he had it previously for a reason.

Some links:
– The

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of Avs radio man Marc Moser, which includes the entertaining call of the Porter goal. It’s about halfway through the thingy.